


Winter's Task

by GretchenSinister



Series: My Top 10 Rise of the Guardians Otherships & Crossovers Fics [8]
Category: Rise of the Guardians (2012)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fairy Tale, Beauty and the Beast AU, Gen, but YES it is gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-11
Updated: 2019-07-11
Packaged: 2020-06-26 04:35:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,349
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19760704
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GretchenSinister/pseuds/GretchenSinister
Summary: Original Prompt: "(Jack Frost/Pitch) Beauty and the beastJust… something based on this comic please: http://fireflyunified.tumblr.com/post/39262237151/hereticality-winter-and-the-beastIt just needs a fully fleshed story *_*"Jack Frost is a story child, but this is not his story. He will do what he can to help the being he meets in the castle’s tower, though. (AKA: genre-savvy fairytale world, but not played for laughs, also me trying to figure out the mechanism of the curse that would fit Pitch.)





	Winter's Task

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on Tumblr on 3/21/2016.

This was not a story for Winter to triumph in. The boy, Jack, knew this. He had listened to and read every story that anyone he’d ever met had ever heard of, and he knew that despite the name he shared with so many of the clever and the brave, that this could not wipe out the circumstances of his birth and before his birth.  
  
That story, he knew better than any others. His parents, childless. His mother crying in despair, louder than the winter wind, that even this season of ice and darkness was more fertile than she. The terrible chill that settled in her womb in the midst of a winter storm, that stayed there and grew until the first frost of autumn, when she was delivered of a child pale and cold as winter.  
  
He was a story-child, and everyone knew it. But no one knew what story he should belong in, for no matter how kind or clever or brave he was, he was still of Winter.  
  
How his parents had sorrowed when he left to seek his fortune! They could not know his likely fate, they had no instructions to give him other than that which might be given to a child not so obviously of story.  
  
But he had survived so far; he had been lucky.  
  
Even the strange beggar women hadn’t known what to make of him, though, when he shared the last of his food with them on his way through the woods. (The third, the last, of course, turning a piece of frozen cheese over and over in her gnarled hands. “I can’t break it apart,” Jack said. “Please take it all.” “Yes, well…” Looking up at him from her stooped frame. “If you need shelter this night, take the eastern fork when the path splits. I…” But there was not much more she could say. “I wish you well, child.”)  
  
It was a well-wish he had been glad to accept, glad it hadn’t been a curse, but it was no comb, no needle, no cloak, nor was it a specific blessing. The women hadn’t had any place to send him.  
  
But he would be glad of shelter for the night, and so he took the eastern fork.  
  
When he was well out of sight of the main path, the trees grew suddenly dense, the shade under them almost as black as night. When the view cleared, it was to a bridge leading over a deep chasm. On the other side stood a narrow, gray castle standing on a narrow, gray column of rock.  
  
It certainly looked forbidding in the deepening twilight, but surely it would be a beautiful place to look out of when the sun rose. Jack set off across the stone bridge, not stopping to wonder who might live there. He’d find out soon enough without wondering.  
  
And so now he was. The castle had fed him, showed him a room to sleep in, and given him new clothes when he awakened in the middle of the night, and so, guessing the story, Jack had gone wandering through the castle, climbing up precipitous staircases and edging through halls bedecked in carvings of strange, nightmarish creatures. He knew this wasn’t a story for Winter, not his story, but he knew that whoever lived in this castle was no doubt very much alone, and he did not want to leave them alone, even if he wasn’t the necessary company.  
  
And so now, in the highest tower, lit only by moonlight falling through empty windows, he asked whatever inhabited the shadows to come out into the light.  
  
The being who stepped forth was very like a man, far more human than Jack had expected. He was taller than any man Jack had yet seen, and thinner, and his skin was gray as the stones of his castle, and his eyes glowed with a strange golden light, but still, covered by a black robe, he looked human enough. Human enough for Jack to wonder if he had read this story wrong.  
  
“Why have you sought me out?” he asked.  
  
“I—I thought you might be lonely,” Jack said.  
  
The glowing eyes were eclipsed in a blink. “I am,” he said. “But this is not a castle of roses. And I was not waiting for you, or anyone like you.”  
  
“Isn’t there any way I could help?” Jack asked.  
  
The being tilted his head. “You are quite brave, aren’t you? But, no, I do not think there is any way you could help. Then again…I have never seen anyone quite like you before, and I can feel the chill of winter flowing from you even where I stand. This is strange to me, and I have lived a long time and read a great many things. Perhaps you would be interested in hearing a story you haven’t heard before?”  
  
Jack nodded.  
  
“Good. It is my story, and it is not finished yet, and I have not told it before, so there will be much it lacks. Perhaps it would even be better if I did not try to make it a story at all. My name is Pitch Black, and I was a king a very long time ago. When I was king I thought that the way to keep my kingdom was to make myself the most feared man in seven kingdoms. I did great harm to many, and after it became clear that neither my mind nor my methods would be changed, the rulers of the seven kingdoms banded together to find a way to stop me. They gathered together the most ancient, the most magical artifacts in their kingdoms, and they used them to put a curse on me. The curse made sunlight inimical to me, and it transformed me so that the hideousness of my appearance was equal to the consequences of the harm and injustice I had done.” The corner of Pitch’s mouth lifted slightly. “When the curse first took effect, my own soldiers could barely stand firm to look at me, much less recognize me. The curse also said that I should live under it without aging until it was broken and I could once again begin to live as a man, and that I was bound to the confines of this castle. My own magic provides for guests, as I have tried to avoid doing any more harm.”  
  
“How is it broken?” Jack asked. “Something must have happened. You don’t look much different than an ordinary man, now.”  
  
“I know exactly how different I look,” Pitch said mildly. “The curse is actually broken quite simply. As the consequences of my harm fade, so I grow more human. After enough time passes, the curse will eventually break. I have looked this way for some decades, now, with no change, however, so perhaps some of my harm cannot fade entirely with time. The curse will also break if the descendants of the seven kings and queens forgive me. But I cannot seek them out, and, with luck, I have been forgotten. So you see, I am waiting for no one. Only time.”  
  
Jack thought for a long moment. “I could seek out the descendants,” he said.  
  
Pitch Black looked at him strangely. “Is that a task for Winter?”  
  
“I don’t know what Winter’s task is,” Jack said with a shrug. “But it doesn’t seem right to leave you here under a curse, and finding the descendants of seven kings and queens seems like something for a Jack to do.”  
  
“I will not say you nay.” Pitch was silent for so long Jack thought this might be all the farewell he received. “Fill your pack from my pantries. After this, go to my stables and you will find a black mare. In her saddlebags will be money for your journey and a map of the old boundaries of the seven kingdoms. I wish you well. And, please…do not tell my story to any but the descendants, or I will be much more monstrous when you return.” 


End file.
